Xaviere Guitars (Good for the money, So I hear)

[oipunkguy]

Yes, you're right, back in the 1930's one could argue an epip was a better instrument, and would probably win that argument. I was merely pointing out why guitar companies would want to jump onto this market.

[jfine]

Not to hijack this thread, but Epiphone was Gibson's budget line only after 1970. The original Epiphone company, who were Gibson's biggest competitor, hit the skids in the early '50's after the death of company head Epi Stathopoulo and facing union problems. Epi's brother Orphie sold out to Gibson because he didn't want to continue running the company. Ted McCarty at Gibson bought Epiphone primarily for their upright bass-building capability, and found that he had also gotten all the guitar-building equipment and work-in-progress as well, so Gibson basically went into competition with themselves, allowing other dealers in areas that already had Gibson dealers to carry Gibson-made instruments under a different name. Epiphones were made in the Gibson factory from 1958 through 1970, by the same people who made Gibsons, and they're every bit the equal of Gibsons from the same period. They cost pretty much the same too--definitely not a budget line. Yet I see articles and books all the time that refer to '60's Epiphones as budget guitars--the new book on Hendrix's gear refers to his Epiphone Wilshire, which he played in the early '60's, as a low-priced model that cost $65! Jimi may have gotten it used for that, in which case he got a heck of a deal as that guitar new would have been around $225, about the same as the Gibson SG Special that it was the equivalent to. OK, hijack over--back to Xaviere guitars...

[oipunkguy]

Thanks for the history lesson. Most of what I've read about Epi was from the early jazz archtops.

[jfine]

There are a couple of good books on the history of Epiphone available--that's where I got my info. I owned a '61 Epiphone Broadway in the early-to-mid '70's--bought it in '73 from the original owner for $150! In the Epi line it was equivalent to the Gibson ES-175, but this had a somewhat larger body, two mini-humbuckers, and the Epiphone Frequensator split tailpiece. They came in sunburst or blonde--mine was blonde. I wound up trading it in '74 for a '59 Telecaster. Talk about being in hog heaven--a lot of vintage guitars were cheap back then, and a musician could work six nights a week and make decent money. I was always trading guitars--it was a running joke in the band I was in that if I had the same guitar two months in a row, something was wrong...

[jtr654]

I remember those day I'ld turn down Fender Jaguar and Jazzmaster that were only $75 and they had case included.

[oipunkguy]

yeah the old ones weren't worth much until after guys like Kurt Cobain started playing them in the early 90's